We LOVE our Kitties!

They're such good entertainment!

So Tired!

As part of our normal daily routine, Alison has "play alone time". It really is the only way to get her to play without us right there playing with her. Usually she only makes it 15-30 minutes before she's hungry for lunch and is at the gate calling for me. This morning she played really well and when the half hour mark hit, she was still quietly playing so I didn't disrupt her. Then it got a little too quiet so I poked my head in to make sure she wasn't up to trouble. I found her talking quietly to herself while playing so I left her in her room. An hour rolled around and I was amazed at how well she did and went to get her for lunch. I found the closet door open and it was dead quiet. I braced myself to find crayon all over the walls or play dough in the carpet. Instead I found her sacked out on the closet floor! She also had pooped and found a bag of snacks. So I'm assuming she pooped, went to the closet where I normally change her diaper, found a snack and fell asleep waiting for me to change her. I'm not sure why she didn't call for me, but it was pretty funny finding her like this. Oh, and what made it perhaps even funnier is that she had gotten into some baby books I had in a box in the closet. So there she lay, surrounded by 'What to expect when you're expecting' and '1000 Best Baby names', covered in graham crackers, asleep. I sat there staring at her for a long time debating whether to wake her up, change and feed her and then put her back down or just let her sleep in her dirty diaper on an empty stomach. Well, she was not wake up-able (another trait she inherited from her daddy) so in her crib she went. I guess we're having an early nap!

Happy Valentine's Day!

We had a really low key Valentine's Day, but we kept some of the old traditions. Ben made up an excuse to leave the house and went to buy some flowers, Reese's peanut butter cups and a toy for Alison. This year he bought her a little wagon and I got her a book. We spent the day playing at home and relaxing.

New Words

I didn't realize how much I say the word 'awesome' until Alison said it the other day. All of the sudden this week she's started repeating everything and putting words together. She'll say, "I sit" or "Daddy shoe". Even last night we were standing in line at Target and Alison started saying, "Mommy cocoa". Ben looked at me said, "Jen, she's repeated the boy in the line next to us asking for cocoa puffs." One the way home from that Target run (we were out way too late) Alison started getting fussy so we had to break out the good ole' ABC's. We were shocked to hear her say perfectly 'stuvwxyz'. We tried to get a good video of it when we got home, but she was a little past the performing time. The last couple of days when we come inside I ask her to take off her shoes and then tell her good job. Today, when she saw me take off my shoes she came over and said, "Good job mommy!"
Alison had her 18 month check up this week. I'm happy to report she is very healthy and right on track. She's 25 pounds (5o percentile) and 2ft 9in (75 percentile).
While I was on the phone with my mom today Alison insisted on putting on her dress shoes and when I tried to take them off she threw a fit. I couldn't help but laugh at my peanut. When I look back at pictures I always think, "Why didn't my mom tell me I looked like a big dork and tell me to change?" and I told myself that I would help Alison through her awkward stages so she didn't look back and think the same thing. But then today I realized why my mom didn't say a thing. Is a pair of shoes really worth the fight? I think I have bigger fish to fry.

So Refreshing!

I went on a retreat with some women from Hope this last week. We stayed at a hotel in Kitty Hawk, NC and were right on the ocean. We had all of our meetings in a building on the pier. I had to be careful that I really listened to the speaker and didn't just stare at the waves crashing onto the shore. It was beautiful and so refreshing.
Alison has started to pretend play, and the day I was getting ready to leave for the retreat she turned our suitcase into a train. Ben had just come home from a Church planters retreat, so there was a lot of coming and going.
Yesterday was absolutely beautiful here and I just wanted to be outside all day. We found a park by the water and walked some of the trails. Alison's favorite was riding the rocking horse...it was my favorite watching Ben ride the horse with her.


Ben broke out the harmonica with the worship team this Sunday. I have to tease him because his contraption looks like headgear, but this is yet another thing that Ben just decided he wanted to play, so he bought one and started playing and of course is amazing at it. This clip also gives you a glimpse of Hope. This is before worship, as people are coming in...you can see the Boomers in the front row.